The safety versus cost dilemma !

A fire at a Quakers Hill nursing home took the lives of eleven residents.  This fire was deliberately lit and the incident has resulted in pressure for legislation to make fire sprinklers compulsory in all buildings used for aged care.   Unfortunately this added cost would probably result in the closure of many facilities - and a sharp drop in the number of aged care beds available to meet our growing needs.

All new nursing homes have been required to have sprinklers since this requirement came into force in 2002.   The Quakers Hill building was modern, but it was constructed in 1981 - and hence it lacked this facility.   Despite heroic efforts by nearby residents and fire crews, smoke inhalation, burns and shock cut a swathe through those who actually survived the fire, only to die days later in hospital.

Adding sprinklers to existing buildings would impose a cost of between $ 3,000 and $ 11,000 per resident, depending on the type of structure involved.    Our nursing home stock is a mix of government supplied buildings, non for profit charities - and private carers who operate on a business basis.

The fees charged in nursing homes is strictly controlled by the Federal government, as is the entry procedure on which beds are allotted.  In the vast majority of cases the money is simply not there to pay for sprinklers if this becomes a condition of license - and many existing nursing homes would have to close their doors and go out of business.

This is a classical safety versus cost dilemma.    All levels of government have the right to dictate safety issues, but at the same time they must accept  responsibility for their actions.   Statisticians are sounding alarm bells about an avalanche of elderly people about to overwhelm existing care facilities and this must be taken into consideration when the sprinkler issue is considered.

There is little point in passing draconian legislation if the end result is a sharp drop in nursing home bed availability.    If sprinkler installation is to become a legal requirement, then both levels of government will need to put their hands in their pocket and pay a substantial proportion of the costs.

It all boils down to a matter of risk analysis.    Horrible as the pictures shown on television were when the Quakers Hill fire was reported, given the number of such fires as against the number of people sleeping in nursing home beds in Australia - the odds of a patient dying in such a fire is about even with getting struck by lightning.

We would all like to think that every nursing home bed had absolute safety - but in this real world -  the cost must be weighed against the risk !